Chronicle of Higher Education: The so-called supercommittee of 12 congressional Democrats and 12 congressional Republicans admitted yesterday that it had failed to carry out its charge: to reach agreement on a series of deficit-reducing measures. The failure triggers automatic spending cuts, which include a $3.54 billion reduction in the budget of the Department of Education. If the automatic spending cuts go through as scheduled in 2013, student-aid programs will lose $134 million, which will affect some 1.3 million students. The Chronicle‘s Kelly Field reports that the cuts to Education are especially severe because they come on top of cuts imposed in 2011 on career and technical education and college preparatory programs.
The finding that the Saturnian moon may host layers of icy slush instead of a global ocean could change how planetary scientists think about other icy moons as well.
Modeling the shapes of tree branches, neurons, and blood vessels is a thorny problem, but researchers have just discovered that much of the math has already been done.
January 29, 2026 12:52 PM
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